The Mom Crowd

You may be paying too much for your prescriptions. It’s easy to accept prescription prices from the pharmacy and just deal with it. However, if you are like me and you are on a high deductible health plan (because we are self-employed), then prescriptions can be very expensive. As a Stay at Home Mom I feel like it is my job to save my family money wherever I can and watching our health costs is just part of my job.

I have had a long day today on the phone with doctors’ offices and pharmacies, but I saved my family about $300 just by spending some time figuring out the prescriptions for my kids.

Here is what I have learned in 5 tips for saving money on prescriptions.

1. Shop Around. This can be a real hassle, but can save you a lot of money. In order to shop around you need to know the name, dose, and quantity of the medicine prescribed. Ask the nurse or doctor to spell out the name for you. Also, ask the doctor or nurse if there is a generic available. Once you are armed with this info, you can call around to the pharmacies and ask for the cash price. Also, you will need the paper prescription from the doctor’s office. So instead of them faxing in a prescription to the pharmacy for you, you need to leave the doctor’s office with it or go pick up the paper copy.

I shopped my prescription around today by phone. CVS, my usual pharmacy was going to charge me $261 for my daughter’s prescription. My grocery store was $96, WalMart was $80, and Costco was $65 for the same prescription. I earned $196 today in 1 hour of work.

2. Ask your doctor for a cheaper alternative medicine. When doctor’s prescribe medicines they aren’t thinking about the cost. Sometimes there is another medicine that can do the same job, but at a cheaper price. We are the doctor’s customer, so they should strive to serve us. Don’t be afraid to ask.

The doctor’s office gave me an alternative if the prescription for my son was going to be too expensive. Also, on a follow-up appointment to my Pediatrician I told her we didn’t get my daughter’s excema cream, because it was going to be $250. She then told me which over-the-counter product I could use. Thankfully that product has worked.

3. You don’t have to get the whole prescription filled. Depending on the prescription type you can fill it a little at a time. Even if the pharmacy has already put your order together, you don’t have to buy all of it. If you have questions, don’t be afraid to ask your doctor, doctor’s nurse, or pharmacist if you need to fill all of the prescription at once.

My son’s prescription today was going to be $355 for a 16 day treatment. Each box is $89 and covers 4 days of treatment. Per my doctor’s instructions I am to use this medicine for 4 days and see if he gets better. So instead of buying all 4 boxes at once, I only bought one. Then I can refill it and get more boxes, once I find out that it works. I may end up spending $355 and buying all 4 boxes, but I may only need 8 days of treatment and I could potentially save us $178.

4. Ask for samples. Sometimes I am too shy to ask, but I have learned to speak up. Sometimes they have samples or a coupon that you can use. It never hurts to ask.

I spoke up the other day at a doctor’s visit and asked about cold medicine for 2 year-olds. There aren’t any cold medicines for 2-year-olds on the store shelves, because of FDA rulings. She gave me two bottles of medicine that I can give my daughter. Free medicine!

5. Check into mail order prescriptions. If you have a regular recurring prescription, then a mail order option may be a lot cheaper. It is not a waste of time to research and ask, because it could save you hundreds of dollars.

How do you save money on prescriptions?